Inept! Looking at the reviews here, it seems that if you are an occasional visitor or you've just lived here a short while, you'll give elk grove four stars. But how about a review from someone who has actually lived here for 20+ years and dealt daily with the utterly baffling lack of foresight by any of the city's officials.
Maybe someone who "visits" here once in a blue moon, going straight to old town then back home, thinks this place is 'charming', but if they lived in this convoluted mess every day, putting up with 30+ (no joke) trains coming through town, causing a complete stop and backup of traffic - sometimes up to 45 minutes - then I think they'd have another idea.
Train Crossing Debacle
There are two major roads to bring the majority of the population from the southeast to the west side of Elk Grove and from there to the freeways, etc., both crossing a railroad line that is CONSTANTLY in use all day, causing mile long backups over and over and over again. As of this week, they've had one of those roadway crossings completely closed for the entire work week now - longer than scheduled, of course - and Heaven only knows when it "really" will reopen.
You want to make things better for citizens, why not make one of the railway crossings an underpass so we aren't stuck waiting for a train several times a day? The all important train traffic can continue on along, and we - for once - won't have to dread trying to find one of the few free periods of time each hour where we won't get stuck waiting - several blocks back - for a train to finally get through the crossing so we can continue along.
Horrible Road Conditions
The city recently spent a fortune repaving roadways near Williamson Road that were perfectly fine in the first place, but have not taken the time in over 10 years to repave miles and miles of cracked, pot-hole ridden roadway along Waterman Road - causing thousands and thousands of cars to have to dodge these cracks and holes, going back and forth, from one side to the other of the single lane available to them when traveling down this road just to keep their car from being damaged.
Refusal to Remedy Traffic Issues
Along that same line, why do the intersections of Waterman and Sheldon, as well as Bradshaw and Sheldon, still have STOP SIGNS???? There are tens of thousands of vehicles traveling those roads and the lousy stop signs cause backups that stretch for miles every single day during the work week?
Worst Library in the Valley
Finally, why would you - city authority geniuses - spend a gazillion dollars on a postage stamp piece of property for an existing building with almost no parking, then spend another gazillion dollars reinforcing that building to hold library books, so that it can immediately be too small and inconvenient to use??? There are literally hundreds of acres available to build a large, convenient, well-planned library with plenty of parking within the city limits???
An example you might have looked at is just down the road a bit in Modesto. The library in Modesto California was built about 50 years ago, when Modesto was just a fraction of Elk Grove's population, and the leadership in Modesto was wise enough at that time to think into the future and build a beautiful, large library that - 50 years later - still makes Elk Grove's "modern" effort at creating a library look ill-planned, puny, uncomfortable, inconvenient, and lacking in any foresight.
Quit playing politics and race, do your job, and make Elk Grove a great place to live again! read more